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Jerksblog!

Date-Based Archive My Extensive and Geeky Collection of Hikaru No Go Wallpaper

Can now be found here. Not that any of you all are interested. You know, in HNG wallpaper. Some of it is just graphics.

Posted by erin at 02:10 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Samurai Champloo: Kicking My Ass

Samurai Champloo is the greatly anticipated new series by the makers of Cowboy Bebop. The first episode came out last week and was subbed by kindly fansubbers over the weekend. I watched it just now, (despite my roommates hiding their computers from me and going to sleep at 10pm last night...yeesh... when did watching TV become a sport?), anyway, needless to say this show kicks ass. It's literally kicking my ass right now. Here are some screenshots:

There was a cute squirrel, but it wasn't about the squirrel.

The guy above is Jin, my new favorite character. The other fellow is Mugen, who's Adan's new favorite character.

Look at that sword flash! There's plenty of that going on.

I hit you with my +3 lightsaber katana.

Posted by erin at 02:53 PM | Comments (8)

Date-Based Archive Harry Potter 3: I Saw It Before All You Suckers!

[Spoiler-Free, I swear.]

Because of Alison leaning on Tom, our company got 20 tickets to the world premiere of Harry Potter 3: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. Sorry I didn't invite any of y'all, I couldn't even bring N., and I could barely get a ticket myself.

Despite the difficulty of getting tickets, and Alison's insistence that “everyone dressed up at the last premiere" she went to (which was just for New York, and not the World), hardly anyone was really dressed up at this premiere… and somehow tons of ordinary-looking people had tickets, including at least two Girl Scout troops. Most of the audience was made up of families.

At this point I’d like to say that premieres are great. There are assigned seats so you don’t have to worry about not getting in (this was at Radio City Music Hall, a classy joint which I've never been to), and all the popcorn and soda is free. On each seat there was a bag with a free T-shirt, a lego set of the “Night Bus”, a bag of gummy slugs, and some suckers. Plus some people dressed as witches and wizards were giving out bags of Every Flavor Beans in the lobby (with two new flavors, “Earthworm” and “Spaghetti”).

There were no previews or commercials before the film, instead, we got to see a live video feed of all the celebrities (mostly cast members and LL Cool J) being interviewed on the red carpet before they went into the theater. Then they played some of the film’s score, kind of like the overture before an old-fashioned movie. Finally some Warner Brothers guy introduced the cast members in attendance, and then they played the movie.

In my opinion, the first Harry Potter movie sucked for the first half hour or so, and then managed to end well, but it wasn’t as good as the first book. I didn’t like the second Harry Potter book very much (my least favorite in the series) but the first hour of the second film was quite good. Then the (second) film screwed up by going on for about 45 minutes too long and having at least three endings.

Now, I didn’t like the “Prisoner of Azkaban” book very much, but I’d have to say that this was a really decent film. Where the other films were inconsistent, this third Harry Potter movie had its act together throughout. The first two films were sprinkled with cringe-ably bad lines, but the third film only had a handful of such cringe-worthy moments, to the point where I’d say there were only half as many bad lines, perhaps fewer, than I found in the first two films. Granted, a good film should be free of bad lines, but I'm willing to allow that not every film ever made can be as minute-to-minute delightful as Fellowship of the Ring.

“Prisoner of Azkaban” was a darker film the first two, and shot in this interesting high-contrast lighting with much darker colors than before. The film is a decent length, without multiple endings, and its paced quite well. The director (whose other films I haven’t seen), has done a good job, making better use of scenery, and using the Whomping Willow tree for some great transitions (which I won’t give away). The Quidditch match in the film is probably the best Quidditch match so far – in that the CG is good and its dramatically tense.

Perhaps the best thing about this film was that there was true dramatic tension from time to time. The climactic scene did have me, so to speak, “on the edge of my seat” trying to compel the characters act in time.

The biggest disappointment of the film is the new Dumbledor. The previous actor was great - every line he had was wonderful to listen to. The new Dumbledor looks very similar but every time he opens his mouth its a little bit of a let-down. Fortunately he doesn't say much.

Rrrg… its hard to write a review that doesn’t give anything away without using really clichéd writing. Granted, I’m no trying very hard. Whatever, you guys should all go see it so we can argue about it. My prediction:

Adan might like it.
Dan might hate it.
N. might not like it (who knows?!).
Kerry’s a wildcard (not enough cute girls, no kung fu training).
Hal will probably hate it (or find it adequate).
Evonne will think its OK.
Sam will probably like it (having read the books, unlike Evonne).
Maggie will think it is “awesome”.

Posted by erin at 11:41 PM | Comments (13)

Date-Based Archive Temping Certainly Does Suck

I had hoped by now there would be more work on the Barbie movies for me. Alas, nothing yet, and my savings has dwindled, so I've had to take some temp jobs.

Because I already work part-time, I can really only temp three days a week, which means the I have to keep calling in to say I'm available the next day, and the kind of temp jobs I get are typically only one or two days long.

This year I've temped at L'Oriel, Thomas Pink (a shirt store), Telemundo, and a Biotech company. The shirt store was the worst - I had to tie ribbons around packages. 200 ribbons to be exact, for some corporate gift order.

I have found that in the typical temp job, if you show up exactly on time it is to your disadvantage, because inevitably, the person you're working for won't be ready for you yet, or sometimes they're not even in yet. Then, once the person who knows what you're doing turns up, it takes another half hour for them to get you set up before you can do anything at all.

So far the best temp job I've worked was Telemundo, since I actually got to do something that required some kind of skill. I had to help with a mail merge. I also got some free food. But Telemundo was still annoying in that it took them an hour to set me up at a computer. During that hour I read a lot of marketing pamphlets about C-NBC (the C-NBC department being next door to Telemundo). Did you know that half of all C-NBC viewers are millionaires? 35% of C-NBC viewers own summer homes! The pamphlet used a lot of humorous synonyms for "f*cking loaded" such as "well-to-do" and "enjoying the good life."

Posted by erin at 12:46 PM | Comments (4)

Date-Based Archive Vanessa is Not Boring

My coworker Vanessa is one of the least boring coworkers I've ever had. Here are some weird things on her list of accomplishments:

• Vanessa drove a schoolbus for a week when she was 17.
• Vanessa has appeared in a photograph on a box of Girl Scout cookies
• Vanessa has bowled in every state in the continental U.S.

I'm so glad not to have coworkers who just talk about baseball and weddings!!

Posted by erin at 12:13 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Funny as Cancer

Today I am temping a biotechnology type place. I didn't realize so many biotech/pharmaceutical companies had such boring names.

Also this temp job requires reading one-word emails, and that word is "cancer."

I find that somehow funny. I'm glad I'm not getting one-word emails that say "cancer".

Posted by erin at 12:26 PM | Comments (2)

Date-Based Archive Lusciously Dyspeptic Peaches

The subject line here is from some spam I got this morning.

So last week one of my youngest cousins (I have at least 13 cousins) emailed me because he saw my name in a story in a local Michigan paper (the Jackson Citizen Patriot) which mentioned that I worked on a cartoon show. I emailed him back and was surprised to find that he really didn't know any of our mutual cousins at all.

Granted, the kid lives a few hour's drive from the rest of my dad's family, so this particular cousin's family doesn't visit the clan a lot... and granted, when all of my 13 cousins used to hang out together, he wasn't really born yet, or was an infant... but still... I knew who he was. I'm third oldest. I know who all of my cousins are on my dad's side.

Weirder still is that I remember when many of my younger cousins were born, and now most of them are in high school. It's bizarre to be old enough to know people who's births I remember who are now in high school.

One of my other, older cousins got married some previous weekend (my cousin Melissa, not the one listed above, Melissa is the same age as me). My high school best friend is also getting married this year, in September. Jen keeps emailing me pictures of bridesmaid dresses. Most of them are sleeveless. It's hard to express to Jen (who can't figure out how to read this blog) that I hate both weddings and sleeveless dresses.

I suspect the next 10 years of my life will be a slew of mandatory baby showers and bridal showers and weddings, not necessarily in that order. I'm not really looking forward to that.

Somewhere deep inside I believe that fun shower-parties and/or weddings must be possible. I think I've gone to one wedding that was OK for almost 90% of the reception. That was my JCC coworker Amy's reception. She wasn't related to me, and I had a lot of friends my own age there. The only awkward part was when my friends started dancing and I refused. (Why were they dancing...? What the hell...?)

Anyway, I guess this phase of life beats out going to divorce proceedings and funerals.

Posted by erin at 01:27 PM | Comments (0)

Date-Based Archive Gotta Get me an Albino Squid

Albino Squid doll!

Posted by erin at 10:50 AM | Comments (3)

Date-Based Archive Box Sake / N.'s Eyebrow

Those of you unfamiliar with the finer points of low-brow American culture may not be familiar with box wine. Box wine is wine on the cheap. It comes in a silver bag inside of a cardboard box, which you put in the fridge and access via a plastic spigot thing. One of my friend's parent's in high school often had box wine in the fridge - at one infamous party an univited guest took the silver bag out of the box and went around offering people "space wine."

Today I went to the Cherry Blossom festival in the Brooklyn Botanical Gardens. Most of you were there, so I don't feel a need to write at great length about the expirience, but suffice to say, they were serving box sake, and I did not drink any of it.

Perhaps more importantly, on Saturday N. had a nightmare. "One of my eyebrows fell off," quoth he. "It kind of rolled away, and I lost it." He shuddered with terror.

Posted by erin at 11:06 PM | Comments (5)